Dubai: Jos Buttler’s hammering would have rattled one of the title favourites Australia in the ICC T20 World Cup but former pace bowler Brett Lee feels it’s not a ‘doom-and-gloom’ scenario for his side just yet, and that Aaron Finch’s team should “relax” and “go about things patiently”.
Using the popular Hindi phrase ‘aaram se’ (take it easy and relax), Lee said that there would be off days but if the intent is right, “everything will be okay”.
“Now it’s not all doom and gloom for Australia — I try and look at things from a positive point of view. There are a lot of people saying, ‘he shouldn’t be in the team’, ‘he shouldn’t be batting there’ and so on. But they say in Hindi, ‘aaram se, aaram se’, and that means to relax and go about things patiently. I think that’s a really good expression that the team can use just to relax. Everything will be okay,” said Lee.
“I know that there could be changes, they might look to shuffle the order, they might look to some different bowling options but sometimes you just get outplayed and England outplayed Australia,” Lee wrote in his column for the ICC.
England wicketkeeper-batter Jos Buttler singlehandedly took the game away from Australia, playing a smashing innings, embellished with five maximums and an equal number of boundaries in his 32-ball 71 as the Eoin Morgan-led side won the low-scoring match by eight wickets and dealt a crushing blow to the Australians’ morale.
“England were outstanding. The 50-over world champions were just too good in the end; it’s as simple as that. 50-over cricket you can play catch up, Test match cricket you’ve got days and it’s like a game of chess, but in T20 cricket if you slip up for an over or two it can cost you the whole game.
“Australia were always on the back foot. David Warner missed out, Aaron Finch got 44 but he had no support through that middle period and 125 is just not enough in T20 cricket. (But) Australia have to move on, they have to understand that they’ve been walloped — that’s a fair assessment and if you ask any of the players they are pretty open and honest with each other, they were totally outplayed,” added Lee.
Lee warned that the top order will need to fire and stalwarts such as Steven Smith, Glenn Maxwell, Marcus Stoinis — who were in good form in the first two games but missed out with a duck against England — will really need to put in better effort in the next game against Bangladesh November 4.
“Matthew Wade has been getting a few runs, getting some starts but Australia need a big 40 or 50 from him to finish so there are areas where Australia can take some positives out. I know the Aussies want to get off to a flyer, I heard Warner say it, I heard it from Aaron Finch and they are two brilliant players, two guys I’d pick in my side every single day of the week.
“Maybe it’s about taking the foot off the accelerator a fraction at the top. I know that some teams go really hard in the first six but other teams don’t take as many risks so perhaps Australia can do that but I’ll still back Warner every day of the week to go down town first ball if he has to,” added the former pace bowler.